Fall Apart
By xannychan
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters.
Short A/N: A lot of people requested that I continue with the story, so…yeah. It's sort of a filler chapter right now, but there's some character development that needs happening. Psychological roller-coasters abound.
Warnings: Non-graphic attempted suicide, one-sided shounen-ai, angst ensues.
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Men that know darkness don't keep diaries or write journal entries. They don't write their personal sentiments out onto paper for only their own eyes to see.
But they know. They remember. And they do not ever forget.
Kai doesn't keep a diary or write journal entries. He remembers the scars that crawl across his skin and he doesn't forget who put them there.
For that reason, he does not speak, because he is afraid that the memories that swirl across his eyes will become more than nightmares, more than terrors of the night. He is afraid that they will become reality once more.
He is afraid of the scent of blood.
So he closes his mind and he does not scrawl his feelings into words that are worth dirt to him. He does not feel or see or taste or hear or smell anything but sweat and tears of work that bears no meaning.
He focuses and concentrates on things that make no sense.
He trains for reasons that are all his own.
When Rei sees all of this, a cold chill runs up his spine, because he also sees Kai in the hospital bed before him.
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Kai doesn't know exactly why he did it. It just sort of…happened.
But he remembers her voice, her touch eternally circling around the small of his back in the mockery of comfort, her voice as soothing and sweet as tea and honey scalding the back of his throat.
He remembers white fluorescent lights and the grey walls close to the color of his own skin. He remembers blobs of color—flutters of white ribbons in black hair, the sharp violet hope and dreams curling on the seashell he clasped in his hand, the blue-green of the world above him, the gentle pink of lips screaming his name, the wild gold of panicking eyes, the brilliant, fresh green of his touch—the violent red of the rocks from the cliff he jumped from. They were the color of blood, and the water was metallic on his tongue, and the air smelled of burnt copper.
He remembers other voices, as well, though they were faint and distant, a long time after the cherry and blue colors of emergency faded into mute colors of death.
"He's going to be okay." "I don't know why this would happen…" "Who could do this?"
"He's lucky to be alive."
Phoenixes never die, and for Kai, it is a curse.
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Everyday, at the precise hour when the sun just touches the horizon, she whispers in his ear gently.
"I didn't choose you so you could run away."
Overhead, the sky turns the color of Rei's hair, as dark as the water he wishes had consumed him.